Mr. Penis didn't even blink when Lea and Hermes threw open the doors to the Big House.
"And they wonder why I did not want to originally reveal that I found you," Hermes was muttering as he paced the room. Lea ignored him, eyes locked into the distance where she could see the racing track. She was surprised to see that the Tenth Cabin had a chariot out there. She was sure that Drew said that they weren't going to participate, but alas, then there was a beautiful cream-colored chariot with soft pink accents on the field. Two beautiful gypsy vanner horses that were a solid chestnut color with pure white hair on their mane and tail.
Drew and who she recognized as Mirajane were standing within it. A faux fur rug sat their feet alongside a tote bag that Lea knew was filled with their special toys. The two of them were checking their appearance in the mirrors that were placed around it while the others rolled their eyes at them. Lea knew not to underestimate them though. Drew's necklace was a weapon in itself.
"I don't trust any of my siblings except like three of them. I wouldn't trust a bible around the rest of them!"
Lea and Dionysos snorted. "I'm sure you didn't come this early to bother me about... what are you talking about again?"
"Kairos," the elder god spat. "Overstepped his bounds by trying to force himself on what's mine."
"Aht," Lea snapped. "I belong to no one."
Hermes waved her words away. "Regardless, I had hoped for you to accept the bond before I presented you to the council that way any that tried to make a move against you and I will have no choice but to face punishment."
Mr. DILF nodded his head, curls bouncing around with the movement. "Gamelioi tou Theoi are incredibly protective of the blessings as they preside under their domain. The line gets a little blurry for those that are already married, but have blessings that come in later." He then tilted his head. "Though of course, Hêbê was infuriated about Alkaios' wives when he was still mortal. I believe it was said that she smiled more than her Mother at the pain that befell him at the suffering of Dēiáneira and Megara."
"The who?"
"Gods of marriage," Hermes stated, a little awkwardly. His wife was one of those gods after all. A beep sounded from his phone and Lea raised a brow when he gave her a slightly guilty look. She already knew about his talking phone. She was just waiting for the day he tried to baby-talk her and press it to her ear. She was the perfect height to kick him in his shin. "I have to go, ástin mín. Eis to epanidein, Leaneíras. Take care of my heart, Brother."
Lea rolled her eyes, turning to look back at the track, feeling the heat of him flashing away.
"Is there a reason that you are still here, Laura Jean?"
Lea turned back to the camp director, "The name is Leaneira, Mr. DILF." The violet-eyed man blinked, mouthing the words to himself. "Anyway, your brother told me to ask you about Nephelê."
The god choked on the tea that had been drinking. He blinked as if processing her words before standing up and removing a panel on the wall and pressing some buttons on the safe. He pulled out a bottle of liquor — Tsipouro? was on the side of the bottle — poured his tea into a plant before topping off his mug. "Haven't heard that name in a while," the god mused. He took a sip from the bottle, eyes zoning out. "Technically speaking, there are two people named Nephelê. Both of them are Nephelai— cloud-nymphs. Father had molded one of them out of clouds to look like Hêrê."
"Aren't you cut off from that?"
"From wine," he corrected. "This is brandy."
"I remember that myth. People always wondered why Sky Daddy never believed The Grand Poobah of MILFS."
Dionysos spluttered and choked, face tinted a bit green as he spat out his drink. "Mother Gaia, please never call either of them that ever again."
With the way that they make her roll her eyes so much, they might actually get stuck. Once his coloring returned to normal, he shook his head. "TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTION," he said loudly. "Ixion violated guest–host relations. It's called xenia and well, it's the concept of hospitality. Xenia consists of two basic rules: The respect from hosts to guests and the respect from guests to hosts. Guests must be courteous to their hosts and not be a threat or burden. Ixion had the audacity to make advances on not only the Queen, but the wife of God of gods. The wife of the King. The wife of his hosts? No, Father could not stand for that, but as the patrons of foreigners, Father couldn't punish Ixion based on only her word as he had not made advance where he could see. It had to be nice and legal... so to speak. So, he made a cloud to look like Hêrê and then Ixion slept with her and bragged about it! Ixion was expelled from Olympus and blasted with a thunderbolt. Zeus ordered Hermês to bind Ixion to a winged fiery wheel that was always spinning."
"Was he the origin of shooting stars?"
Mr. DILF snorted a little sadly. "No." Clearing his throat, his eyes were a little sad when he looked blankly into his cup. "No. Shooting stars are the tears of gods and goddesses longing for their lost loves. The ones that weren't our soulmates, but the ones that we loved all the same."
Lea had the absent thought if Hermes' tears ever flew across the sky.
"The second Nephelê was the first wife of King Athámas of Boeotia. They had two kids. Phrixos and Héllē. Afterwards, Nephelê went back to the heavens as Athámas went on to marry Inô, daughter of Kádmos and Harmonia."
Lea blinked. "Ain't that's the one with the cursed necklace? The one that killed like generation after generation. Wait… ain't that's your, oh, um… ahem, yeah."
His lips twitched. "Yeah. She's my grandmother. My mother's mother. The second to fall victim to the necklace's curse."
Lea shifted awkwardly.
"Inô was my aunt. The second child of Kádmos and Harmonia. She raised me up, but before that… she married Athámas and gave birth to two kids. Learchus and Melikértēs. We were raised together." There was pain in his eyes. "Before I came there, Aunt Inô had arranged for Phrixos to be sacrificed to the gods so that one of her own sons could inherit the throne. Nephelê heard of the plot though, so she sent the Krios Khrysomallos to carry Phrixos and Héllē away to safety. As they were flying over the sea, Héllē fell off and from this sea was called Hellespont. Phrixos, however, was carried to Colchis, sacrificed the ram, and placed its golden fleece in the temple of Arês. The very fleece which, guarded by a dragon that Jason and the Argonauts eventually came to collect."
"What happened to your aunt?"
"Ah, well she inherited my grandmother's necklace after my Mother. And after finding out that she and my other aunts, Agaúē and Autonoë, raised me up, Hêrê drove Athámas mad and he killed Learchus. Inô was able to escape with Melikértēs and they leapt into the sea where they were transformed into gods now known as Leukothea and Palaimon. Unfortunately for my other aunts, they met their end when I returned to Thebes. My cousin, Pentheús, the son of Agaúē refused to recognize my divinity alongside his mother and did not grant me the proper worship as a god of great stature. So, I lured him to the woods where those that I already brought into my worship as maenads. When he made it there, Agaúē and Autonoë tore him to pieces for spying on them. They tore him apart limb by limb and Agaúē, personally, carried his head on a stick back to Thebes, and only realize the truth of what she had done when Grandfather Kádmos confronted her."
He shrugged as he said it all so casually. "A part of me may have been able to excuse the disrespect towards the gods. Maybe. But what I could not excuse was learning that all three of my aunts spread the rumor that my Mother only endeavored to conceal unmarried sex with a mortal man, by pretending that Zeus was the father of her child and said that her destruction… her death was a just punishment for her falsehood. I fear if Hêrê had not already sought revenge, I may have also though Mother and I have reconciled with Aunt Leukothea in the passing years." He took a sip of his brandy, sighing in refreshment.
Terrifying.
"Ahh, it looks like the races are about to start."
Lea blinked and sure enough it was.
As the chariots lined up, more shiny-eyed pigeons gathered in the woods.
Tantalus waved his hand and the starting signal dropped. The chariots roared to life. Hooves thundered against the dirt.
The chariot of the Eleventh Cabin rammed into the Seventh Cabin's chariot making it flip over. The two riders were thrown from it and not even a second later, the Stolls — Hermes' most protective and klepto children — were also eating dirt.
Mirajane pressed something on the Tenth Cabin's chariot and an actual red carpet emerged to cover the track in front of them and their horses trotted along as if it were a parade.
It was nice and innocent until Drew summoned her bow and arrows, drawing exclamations of shock from the spectators and letting her arrows fly. A thick cloud of smoke covered them and blocked everyone's sight until the Twelfth Cabin's chariot tumbled out of the smoke and the riders landed harshly on the ground with LOSER written on their faces in lipstick. A second later, the Fourth Cabin tumbled out with their chariot on fire and their horses now had suction-cup arrows sticking from their heads like unicorn horns.
Percy and Tyson were up ahead struggling against the Ninth and Fifth cabin while steadily catching up to the Sixth Cabin. Beckendorf did something that led to three sets of balls and chains shooting straight toward their wheels, but Tyson blocked them and then shoved them away.
Drew's arrows flew through the sky, this time catching a bunch of those demon birds all against once. Another cloud of smoke emerged around them before more arrows shot through it, knocking Beckendorf off course though it wasn't really needed as he was being mobbed by the demon birds.
The birds dived down towards the riders, but whatever was in the perfume cloud that Mirajane had summoned had Tweety-Bird and his friends going SPLAT!
Buzzie, Flaps, Ziggy and Dizzy alongside a thousand other demon birds — going unnamed because Lea was running out cartoon bird names — started dive bombing the spectators in the stands.
Clarisse and her sibling just kept going and Lea could see a faint glimmer over their chariot — a net maybe? Her skeletal horses seemed immune to the distraction. The Buzzard Brothers pecked uselessly at their empty eye sockets and flew through their rib cages, but the stallions kept right on running.
"Ahh, stymphalian birds. Pets of Artemis and Arês. You never know who you're dealing with when it comes to those little terrors though." He stood with a grumble. "Come on, Luna Lovegood. Hermês will kill me if something happens to you and I need to do the paperwork for this." He stomped up the stairs like a petulant teen while grumbling to himself. "I hate doing paperwork."
Lea followed after him towards the office that overlooked the front patio. All she could really see was the dying tree in front of her.
"I think you already know what this quest is," Dionysos mused as he reached for a pápuros scroll. "You earth-shaking children are somehow good at fitting pieces of a puzzle together." He hummed, gliding across the scroll with his pen-thingamajig.
The sound of footsteps rushed through the hallways and Lea peaked out to see Percy and Annabeth rushing into Chiron's old room.
"Smart," Dionysos hummed. "The stymphalian birds are hunters. They have extreme focus on their targets to tear them into pieces and to not miss at all. Even mageia would not do much against them as they tear through it like it was crafted from air. Though, Hekatê, Kirkê, Pasiphaê or any other that practice pharmakeia would be able to tame them as they are divine. Loud noises startle them out of that focus."
"What are they doing?"
"Kheirôn has a truly appalling taste in music. It may remind him of the old days when he resided on Mount Pēlion. The comforting sound of the countryside, the pastures and wild forests. Some days they do remind me of the maenads and the Orgies from the olden days. We'd go deep within the forest and the frenzies that overtook them were jaw-dropping. Wine, sex, a little murder, and pure ecstasy."
Lea scrunched her nose up in disgust, peeking out the door to watch as Percy and Annabeth ran back outside.
Down at the track, the chariots were in flames. Drew and Mirajane's chariot had parked behind Clarisse's and they were viciously attacking the birds that were flying around their siblings — and only attacking the ones around their siblings.
Tantalus, like an idiot, chased breakfast pastries around the stands, every once in a while yelling, "Everything's under control! Not to worry."
Dumbass.
And then the most god awful sound filled the air. Lea covered her ears as the screeching of violins and words she'd heard from an exorcism movie started playing. Something hit the back of her shoulder, and she turned to see earplugs falling to the ground.
Thank God— Dionysos in this case. Not the Big Daddy!
Soren, Gylfie, Twilight, Digger and Thorondor, Gwaihir, Landroval went nuts. They started flying in circles, running into each other like they wanted to bash their own brains out.
Annabeth shouted something, and the children of Apollo took aim alongside some of the kids of Ares, Aphrodite, and Hephaistos.
Very few escaped, but they left behind enough of their brethren to feed an army for weeks. And Lea knew how much Drew loved squab.
Some of Drew's siblings were pouting about their hair and clothes while the others reached into their Nanny McPhee bags and started bringing out hair supplies and sewing supplies which some of Apollo and Ares' kids took to heal the ones that clawed deep enough for stitches.
The camp was saved — a pity — and the wreckage wasn't pretty — not a pity; the place could definitely do with a makeover. Most of the chariots had been destroyed. Almost everyone was wounded, bleeding from multiple bird pecks.
Tantalus walked over to the finish line and placed golden laurels on top of Clarisse's head and passed a silver pair over to Mirajane. He then turned towards Percy with a malicious smile and Lea was stomping out of the house without so much as a goodbye.
NOTES:
Alkaios is Herakles' birth name!
Remember that Dionysos' punishment is that he is not allowed to drink wine (so instead drinks several liters of Diet Coke). they are other liquors, and idk about yall, but i would definitely take advantage of that loophole.
WORD COUNT: 2,543
REPLIES:
mide1718: in the case of Halirrhóthios, I agree. Though if you look at the two myths surrounding him, one of them says that Poseidôn was the one to send Halirrhóthios to Athens so I like to believe that it wasn't so much as anger that Arês' killed him, but more so that if he did not send him, then none of it would have happened. It does not excuse Halirrhóthios in any shape or form or thought, but moreso, he wouldn't have had the chance to do so if Poseidôn had not sent him there.
The gods adored their children and were protective of them and on the occasion, they showed remorse for how their actions affected the children's lives. For example, in PJO Poseidôn tells Percy that he's sorry that he was born because a hero's fate is never happy. In the actual myths, Aphroditê literally names her son, Aineías, his name from the adjective αὶνóν (ainon, "terrible"), for the "terrible grief" (αὶνóν ἄχος) he has caused her by being born a mortal who will age and die.
In Odyseús and Polyphēmos', the gods, despite those that were helping the mortal, were still furious about how Ahkilles' had treated Hektōr's body and of Kassandra by Ajax the Lesser. It was also all about the legacy that was left behind also. In such a patriarchal soceity, an attack on the sons were also like an attack on the Father (and an attack on the daughters were like an attack on their honor and property). A lot of factors go into it.
In all, I think it's about being protective of his children but also noting the outside influences. And he didn't seem to harbor any hard feelings towards Arês afterwards as when Hêphaistos caught him and Aphroditê, Poseidôn petitioned for Arês' freedom and said that if the elder son of Zeus didn't repay the dowery, then he would do so himself.
